PREFACE
TO THE FIRST EDITION.
It is believed that the Poems in this volume, composed as they were under circumstances of unusual affliction, will be read with a peculiar interest. They are the record of a secluded sufferer; yet surely, in a world like this, of vicissitude and sorrow, they cannot fail to touch some chord of sympathetic feeling. We are not fitted for the condition of human life,—we are not cultivated to the extent of the capabilities of our nature, if to us the genuine expressions of sorrow are not eloquent. It is for a benevolent purpose, that God has wrought into our souls a capacity of receiving the impression of another's joys or sorrows. It is this capacity which unites us most truly to our fellow-beings. Without it, we should be solitary and sad in any part of God's universe. Without it, knowledge would lose half its value, prosperity its highest charm, and suffering its most grateful alleviation. The Scriptures make their appeal to us through this principle of our nature. Without this power of sympathy, we can hold no communion with Prophets and Apostles; and without it, the subduing narrative of a Saviour's sufferings would have been given to us in vain.
